The most important thing to understand about Xmonad is that it was created as a barebones, no distractions window manager. Because of this, there is a lot of customization and tweaking involved to get a working environment you are completely happy with. This may seem like a downside. However, consider the control one now has over their desktop environment – the sky’s the limit. If having to get your hands dirty crafting some custom code seems like a daunting task, that’s understandable. But, everyone has to start somewhere, and if you’re interested in some serious desktop overhaul then here’s the place to start.

I created this tutorial because I realized that there was a gap in Xmonad documentation. There existed copy-and-paste docs that explained nothing, or lengthy explanatory docs that, unforunately, didn’t have anything to copy-and-paste! That’s why I created the tutorial for beginning beginners – it’s half explanation and half code samples to get you started. If you’re ready, let’s get to Installing Xmonad.